Ann Leamon stands by the Medomak River outside her home in south Waldoboro on Thursday, June 5. Leamon, who is always motivated by a good story, said she falls into chapters of her life hoping to learn something interesting. (Molly Rains photo)
So far, Ann Leamon’s life has taken her around the world to traverse the landscapes of economics and venture capital, competitive bike racing, baking, creative writing, and more. But no matter where she lands, Leamon said, most of the decisions the Waldoboro poet and writer has made are shaped by a love of learning and stories.
“I just sort of fall into things because I’m going to learn something interesting, and it ends up generally working out, and if it doesn’t, then I figure out the next thing to do,” she said.
Leamon was born in Iowa the eldest of four siblings, but her childhood was largely New England based. Her parents moved their family to Lewiston when Leamon was 4 years old to allow her father – a specialist in the history of the American Revolution in Maine – to pursue professorship at Bates College. He would ultimately be on college’s faculty for decades.
When Leamon was still young, the family relocated to Poland, where they lived in a home “full of books,” she said. Leamon traced her love of stories to this time, when she and her siblings also spent hours at the Poland library.
“It’s this little brown toad of a building, and it had books, and we read indiscriminately,” Leamon said.
Through reading, Leamon said, she became more self-aware and conscious of her own character. She also gained a sense of wonder and a lasting love for narrative.
“We’re storytelling animals,” Leamon said. “That’s how we make sense of our world. I love the stories.”
Leamon attended Poland’s elementary school, and then Hebron Academy, where she unwittingly enrolled a year early after attending a preliminary interview. Her family intended for Leamon to start the following year, but Leamon didn’t know that.
At the interview, she said, the Hebron representative “said something that I interpreted as, ‘Well, why don’t you come back tomorrow?’”
Leamon did. Her mother, busy with Leamon’s young siblings, didn’t initially know Leamon had switched schools of her own accord, she recalled. A few days later, the principal of the elementary school called her mother to inquire about Leamon’s whereabouts.
“She said, ‘I thought she was in school!’” Leamon said. “We had a small farm. She was busy.”
After Leamon’s whereabouts were confirmed, she remained enrolled at Hebron. When she graduated – a year early, thanks to her “skipping” in as a youngster – she decided to visit a friend of her mother’s in Sweden for a gap year.
“Never offer me a place to stay, because I will take you up on it,” Leamon said. “Poor Jude sort of got this letter saying, ‘Oh, by the way, I’m going to come live with you for a year.’”
In Sweden, Leamon became fascinated by the language and grew determined to learn Swedish. When she returned to North America to attend the University of King’s College in Halifax, Nova Scotia, however, Swedish was not on the syllabus. German was, though, so Leamon enrolled as a German major, hoping the study would help her eventually learn Swedish, too. It was somewhat successful, as Leamon said she now can understand Swedish, though she does not easily speak it.
She later added an economics major, motivated partly by practicality – “I figured I’d better get something together that could structure me,” she said – and partly by her fascination with the magazine The Economist, which she had started buying from a magazine stand in Halifax.
In this way, Leamon’s interest in economics, as with many of her other interests, has its roots in her love for well-told stories.
After graduating, Leamon moved out to Montana, where she spent a lot of time riding her bike and racing. When she cracked her pelvis in a bike crash, she turned to academia to pass the time while she was out of commission.
Leamon found work as a teaching assistant in the economics department through a family connection at the University of Montana, and in the process began graduate studies in economics herself. Leamon’s work from this period – in which she focused on downtown rehabilitation – continues to inform her work today, including her work on the Waldoboro Economic Development Committee, she said.
It was also while in Montana that Leamon first began to consider the possibility of writing poetry. Listening to NPR one morning, she heard a program about the poet Richard Hugo.
Leamon was inspired by the program. When she later happened to ride her bike past Kicking Horse Reservoir, she was reminded of one of Hugo’s poetry collections named after the site. Seeing the place for herself made the world of poetry suddenly more real, Leamon said.
“All of a sudden, writing poems, being a poet, became a possibility,” she said.
Poetry has been a cornerstone of Leamon’s life ever since.
Upon returning to Maine after her graduate studies, Leamon had several different jobs including as a senior economic and load forecaster for Central Maine Power Co. and as a senior business analyst at L.L. Bean.
At L.L. Bean, one of Leamon’s jobs was writing a newsletter about the business landscape, a task she adored.
“I loved it. I loved the analytical questions that came up, and I loved the fact that I was writing about it,” she said.
Seeking this feeling would continue to guide Leamon in her career. After her time with L.L. Bean, she began working as a case writer at Harvard Business School, penning extended word problems and analyses of business problems that are used to teach MBA students.
Leamon said her career path has shown her that finding one’s calling is about figuring out what comes naturally.
“I think it’s a huge thing for people to get over the idea that if you’re going to get paid for something it has to be hard,” she said. “There are things that come easily to you, but they don’t come easily to other people, so people will pay you to do them, and you’ll like doing them and you’ll do them really well.”
Leamon wrote cases primarily for the venture capital and private equity class, where she developed a close relationship with two professors, Josh Lerner and Felda Hardymon. Writing cases, Leamon said, requires the ability to weave many factors together into an engaging narrative in which all the important pieces are present for students to uncover.
“Part of what you’re teaching the students is what’s material and what’s not,” she said.
Throughout her career, Leamon has kept up her interest in creative writing. In 2006, she embarked on an MFA in poetry at Bennington College, in Vermont, where she refined her identity as a poet.
During this time, Leamon had also just married her husband, John Berges, who she had first met at a foot race. The pair bonded over their shared love of athletics, and Berges supported Leamon as she completed the intense work required for her MFA.
Harvard Business School does not typically have case writers remain on staff for too long, Leamon said, so when she realized it was time for a change, Leamon began to wonder where her next step would take her.
It was then that she and Lerner decided to go into business together. Through their firm, Bella Private Markets, the pair provided consulting, policy analysis, and support to companies and organizations around the globe.
The company was a fast success, Leamon said, growing from zero to 40 customers.
In 2020, Leamon sold her share of the company to Lerner to embark on a semi-retirement. She has used the time to engage more with her creative writing work, Leamon said, including picking up an eco-fiction romance novel she started years ago and finishing it. She is already working on another novel and continuing to write poetry and edit and write nonfiction, including a textbook on venture capitalism she co-wrote with Lerner. She also goes on long walks with her rescue dog, Bella.
Leamon said one thing she loves about Waldoboro – where she and Berges moved in 2022 – is the many ways the town presents to get involved in the community. Leamon is co-chair of the Waldoboro Democratic Town Committee, a board member with the Friends of the Waldoboro Public Library, and a member of the town’s economic development committee. She is also involved with the local poetry scene, and continues to share her writing.
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